India dubs it a ‘doctored’ statement , raises possibility of Yadav having been abducted .
New Delhi : The tit for tat spat between India and Pakistan continues. Even as India was hosting the Pakistani joint investigation team at the Pathankot air base, where it is collecting evidence related to the terror attack, the Islamabad military establishment put out a ‘confession’ of the Indian ‘RAW agent’.
The ‘confessional’ statement contained in a six minute video, which was aired at a press conference, reaffirmed the Pakistan allegation that the person detained for espionage is a serving Indian naval officer. Presiding over the ‘confession’ of the ‘Indian spy’ were Pakistani military spokesman Lt General Asim Bajwa and information minister Pervez Rashid.
The footage shows the man, identified by Pakistan as Kulbhushan Yadav, making a series of comments that reinforce Islamabad’s allegations about India fuelling a separatist movement in Balochistan, its largest but least developed province, and inciting violence in financial capital Karachi.
Indian government sources dismissed the ISI’s claim for having no basis in fact, terming it as a diversionary tactic to deflect attention from Pakistan’s own accountability for terror acts in India. India has also raised the possibility of the man being abducted.
“The video has this individual making statements which have no basis in fact. That the individual claims to make the statements of his own free will not only challenge credulity but clearly indicates tutoring,” a statement by the Foreign Ministry said.
India also pointed out its diplomats have not been allowed access to Yadav, who it says appears to have been running a legitimate business in Iran. “Our enquiries reveal that he apparently was being harassed while operating a legitimate business from Iran. While we probe this aspect further, his presence now in Pakistan raises questions, including the possibility of his abduction from Iran,” the government said.
Yadav says in the video that he began working as intelligence recruit after the attack on the Indian Parliament in 2001 in which nine people were killed and that he then set up a small business in Iran which provided him cover for frequent trips to Pakistan before becoming a RAW agent in 2013. He says he was caught while trying to cross over to Pakistan from Iran on March 3.
JIT treated as state guest
The five-member Pakistani Joint Investigation Team accompanied by Indian officials visited the “sanitised” areas at Pathankot airforce base. The team was ferried in a chopper to Sri Guru Ramdas International Airport in Amritsar and then left for Pathankot by a bullet-proof car amid tight security provided by crack commandos.
However, the team had to be escorted to the backside of the air base as workers of the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party were protesting at the main gate against the visit. A large number of security personnel, including a Punjab Police SWAT team, were also deployed in view of the visit. Officials said the JIT visited the sanitised areas of the IAF base where the attackers had sneaked into leading to the over 80-hour gun battle that left at least four terrorists and seven security personnel dead.
The AAP and the Congress protesters accused the BJP led government of hurting the sentiments of Indians by allowing the Pakistan team to probe a terror attack on Indian soil. AAP’s Delhi Minister Kapil Mishra, said, “For the first time in 35 years, we are saying that ISI is not supporting terrorism… the same people who have killed our people have come here…this is so shameful and disgusting. This is an insult of our mother India. We will not let Modi government to do this.”
The Pakistani team includes ISI’s Lt Col rank officer Tanvir Ahmed, Lahore’s Deputy Director General Intelligence Bureau Mohammad Azim Arshad, Military Intelligence Lt Col Irfan Mirza and Gujaranwala CTD Investigating Officer Shahid Tanver. It will hold discussions with the NIA investigators on Wednesday and it is expected that now an Indian team of investigators would visit Pakistan.
